SACRAMENTO, CA - University of California President Richard Atkinson’s recent proposal to eliminate the SAT I as a requirement for UC admissions is foolish and wrongheaded. Worse, his motivation for dropping the SAT seems based more on racial politics than on educational concerns.

Although Atkinson disparages the SAT, other college officials endorse the test, which focuses on higher order reading and math skills. Jack Blackburn, dean of admissions at the University of Virginia, says that the SAT is a very good test that provides important information about an applicant. Indeed, a 1997 study by the College Board, which oversees the SAT, showed that a combination of SAT scores and high-school grades is a better predictor of student success in college than grades alone.

Atkinson’s claim that the SAT discriminates against African Americans and Hispanics is without merit. A 1993 College Board study, which looked at 46,379 students at 55 colleges and universities around the country, found that “for most ethnic groups the SAT alone is a better predictor of course grades than are high school grades alone.” Significantly, for African Americans, Hispanics, and American Indians, “the SAT tends to predict a slightly higher GPA than the students actually earn.”

Officials at Harvard, Stanford, the University of Michigan, and the University of Texas point out that the SAT is the best instrument for establishing a common national yardstick. The SAT allows colleges to compare students from widely varied high schools and backgrounds without excessive reliance on grades, which, as a UC report admits, are subject to biases due to differences in high-school curricula and grading practices.

Increased reliance on high-school grades, however, may not increase African-American and Hispanic enrollment at UC. A 1997 UC study found that if SAT scores were eliminated as admissions criteria, the current GPA admissions standard of 3.3 in core high-school courses would have to be raised to 3.65 in order to keep the pool of eligible students at the state-mandated top 12.5 percent of public high-school graduates. Under such a scenario, white eligibility would increase by 17 percent, Hispanic eligibility would rise only slightly, and African- American eligibility would fall by 18 percent.

Given that dropping the SAT and simply relying on high-school grades won’t increase minority admissions, Atkinson’s fall-back position is to support a so-called “holistic” approach that emphasizes student life experiences. Such a process means more subjectivity and arbitrariness. Should we give more power to admissions officials to make the subjective decision that the life experience of one student is more valuable than that of another? Also, in view of the tens of thousands of applications, how can such decisions be made fairly? Increased arbitrariness is especially troubling when it involves a taxpayer-supported institution like the UC.

UC Regent Ward Connerly says that Atkinson is constantly pressed by minority legislators to “get our people in and we don’t care how you do it.” It is clear that Atkinson’s proposal is a backdoor way to override Prop. 209 and UC’s own ban on racial preferences. The reintroduction of race into admissions will open a Pandora’s box of evils and should be rejected. In 1998, the UC faculty committee that sets admissions requirements publicly stated its support for keeping the SAT. The UC regents should follow that advice and ignore Atkinson’s proposal.

- By Lance T. Izumi